It was fun while it lasted. This internet thing became too powerful, and shifted the balance of power too much to the people. Politicians found a partner in the content industry, and here we have it. After a mysterious unexplained 180 by a Dutch political party, ACTAhas been signed by all 27 members of the EU. In the meantime, it's looking like SOPA, despite delays, is going to make it through, despite fierce opposition from the technology industry (except Apple and Microsoft, who don't care about a free and open web) and the very architects of the internet. To top it all off, UMG apparently has complete control over YouTube's content, allowing them to remove any video they don't like without even having to invoke the DMCA.

You know what? Every time I read about our modern day politics (and this goes on not just in the US, but here as well) I'm reminded of the Roman Empire just right before it started crumbling. Rampant corruption, gluttony, total disconnect between the state and the people, decadence to levels us normal folk can barely imagine...

It's hard not to think that this is somehow going to end with the people taking up arms (in whatever shape or form). For some reason, I'm slowly but surely starting to understand why even non-redneck, well-educated left Americans value the right to bear arms so much. "
Exactly Thom, our right to bear arms is our insurance policy for if(and probably when) the government gets too out of hand. The forefathers of the US knew that one day the government would be corrupted again, its a pattern in history, so they gave us this way out to start all over.

Exactly Thom, our right to bear arms is our insurance policy for if(and probably when) the government gets too out of hand. The forefathers of the US knew that one day the government would be corrupted again, its a pattern in history, so they gave us this way out to start all over.

Ok, so basically you have no clue what the 2nd Amendment actually is and what right it actually grants you as an American citizen. I'll just cut to the chase and say your entire statement is false.

Exactly Thom, our right to bear arms is our insurance policy for if(and probably when) the government gets too out of hand. The forefathers of the US knew that one day the government would be corrupted again, its a pattern in history, so they gave us this way out to start all over.

That's a bit naive, childish even thinking.

NVM how not necessarily supported by recent history (fall of Soviet-backed regimes most notably, often with big Soviet armies in the place - bloodless to a remarkably large degree ...but if the extreme factions / crazies would have their way, I'm not so sure; vs. ...look at some more recent turmoil in few parts of the world - when people are armed, you get what is really a civil war - and only foreign interventions with serious usage of military fist is what often tips the scales)
NVM how, now, the militia envisioned by "perfect mythological forefathers" probably wouldn't stand a chance against a modern standing army.

In particular, it's a simplistic "us vs. them" thinking - and not only "where do you think the people in ~govs & bureaucracies come from?", also total disregard of how the extreme factions, those most trigger-happy, are also of the prime interest and often the most heavily infiltrated (helps how they are a small & focused target, too) ...and there are MANY ways to get people on the "payroll" of ~security services.
(I would suggest watching one "TV Theatre" fabulously covering those issues, in harder times at my place, Miś Kolabo - quickly checking out, it's on http://youtu.be/-jqT8eC__Uc ...sadly, I don't think EN subtitles exist anywhere; a member of "Polonia" should suffice, even if some nuances would escape them / on average this diaspora is generally way too disconnected for too long)
And, maybe worse, also some trigger-happy white trash who would come armed and potentially jeopardise any organic process (generally, revolutions don't promote the "best" people, but the most ruthless ones)

Yes, you are possibly (justifiably) counting on the military not firing on the "revolutionaries", perhaps even protecting them ...which means that the military (and undoubtedly also many police forces, etc.) would be the real muscle, anyway.

(curiously, with how the US recently formally became essentially a state under martial law, one might ponder if that wasn't also sneaked in by some in the military for the purpose of a possible sort of legal coup d'etat...
...but overall, really, probably too many are "in" for the easy living & perks which military career brings; and, most importantly, readily susceptible to propaganda ...about the terrorists or, say, commie revolutionaries / inciters who want to take over the Land Under God - come on, a short while ago the majority of US troops in Iraq still thought the place had something to do with 9/11...)